NBC National Heads Up Championship line up revealed

Wednesday, 24 February 2010

Huck Seed will face some extremely tough competition as he attempts to retain his Heads Up crown.

Organisers have announced the 64 players who will be battling for this year's National Heads Up Championship. The field includes no fewer than 12 former WSOP Main Event champions, numerous bracelet winners, cash game legends and a sprinkling of celebrities.

There are a few notable names that are missing though. There's no place for recent PartyPoker Premier League winner David Benyamine, WPT Championship Yevgeniy Timoshenko or double WSOP Final Table finisher James Akenhead. Perhaps wanting a quiet life, organisers haven't invited Luke Schwartz either. Double bracelet winner JP Kelly is the only Briton to be invited to the party.

"The lineup of competitors for this year’s event is the best yet,” says Jon Miller, executive vice president of NBC Sports. "Continually bringing together the best of the best to compete in this unique format has made the National Heads-Up Poker Championship one of the most anticipated poker events of the year."

The action takes place at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas from 5th to 7th March and will be televised later this year. The winner will take home a first prize of $500,000.

Tuesday is the deadline for all working Americans to have submitted their income tax returns to the federal government and Juicy Stakes and Intertops Poker are set to mark this annual occasion by holding a special freeroll competition featuring a $1,000 top prize.

“We run a lot of higher stakes tournaments for our more hard-core players,” said Intertops’ poker manager. “But since our network is generally pretty soft, we created this series to give less competitive players a shot at winning.”